Whispers In The Dark
by Rozen Krone
Summary: Trans-Dimensional AU. Unable to find the final Horcrux, Potter settles with pushing the Dark Lord through the Veil. Problem solved, right? Well, not really... (Wherein Potter-Black vows to see the Dark Lord dead, even if she has to cross dimensions and burn the Hidden Leaf down to do it.) Darker!Fem!Harry/Naruto; FemNaruAnko.
1. Welcome To The Leaf

_**Disclaimer: **Multiverse Theory states that for each and every choice that is made, an alternate reality is formed. In one such universe, I do, in fact, own Naruto. In another, the Mice have long since subjugated Earth's third most intelligent species, the Humans. Unfortunately (or, rather, fortunately), this is not that universe._

_**Warnings:** This story contains depictions of several types of mature content, ranging from abuse to language to murder to terrorism, blah blah blah. I do not condone the actions seen in this fic; awful things will happen and those responsible will oftentimes get away with it. The opinions of the characters in this fic do not reflect the opinions of the authoress. Remember, it is rated M for a reason. Flames will be posted on my Twitter and thoroughly mocked._

_**Preface: **Welcome one and welcome all, greetings and such. Anyways, I recently fell in love with the Elemental Nations and all the side characters suffering therein, although I'm bored to tears of Uchiha Madara and his merry band of ragtag walking corpses. Thing is, I'm an exceedingly quiet person and Naruto's canon personality pre-Shippuden gives me a migraine. So I needed a villain to slay, and an (anti)hero to slay him. And Potter certainly will, even if she has to burn down Konoha to do it._

* * *

**Whispers In The Dark**

**~ And Other Morally Reprehensible Things ~**

**by Rozen Krone**

**Introduction: Welcome To The Leaf**

I startle awake and realize the fucking Veil worked as advertised.

My unconscious shifting digs the wooden splinters further into my back. A slow fluttering of my eyelids is my only show of surprise as the flesh flickers with... _something..._ and knits itself back together around the intrusions. A sense of foreboding emanates from my heart and coils itself into a tight ball, taking my breath away.

A wave of a hand, a Conjuring of light, and - Yep.

_Fuck._

I'm in another _bleeding_ closet.

Above me lies a black stone ceiling that hangs at Crabbe or Goyle's waist-height 'round Seventh Year. Beneath me rests a jagged wooden pallet that was somehow more cruel than sleeping on the freezing floors. All around me, walls enclosed me entirely _too tightly – _shuddering, I jerk away and tumble through the wooden door that was my only protection from this new and unimproved world beyond the Veil.

A long, dark, and breezy hallway stretches away from me. The cold bites me without mercy, fogging my breath and chilling my flesh. Twitching, I realize that whatever unlucky kid who's body I'm possessing like fucking Voldemort is wearing only a ragged tunic.

Shivering in apprehension, my hand slices through the frigid air. The onyx wall of rock in front of me shimmers silver before the very edge Transfigures into a suitable mirror.

I see scruffy blond hair, bright cerulean eyes, and childlike features that are lacking the pudgy pallor I'm accustomed to catching on children this age. The body is entirely too short for my comfort, but not malnourished; my mind spins for a moment before angling metaphorical fingers at that regenerative effect I noticed earlier.

Then, I see it: two, triangular protrusions atop my head, that I had oh-so-foolishly believed to be tufts of my hair. A weight on my tailbone, and-

Christ.

I had planned for everything: contingencies within contingencies, fully developed and realized plans from a to triple-z. I thought I had embraced my Slytherin side.

Nope. A Potter's life can never be simple.

I nibble at my lip with incisors that are surprisingly sharp. I wonder...

A diagnostic spell I picked up from far too many trips to the Hogwarts School's Infirmary bleeds from my fingertips. Mundane, mundane, mundane, there: an entire network pulsing with an energy I do not understand, like a magical parody of a circulatory system. Falling into a meditative state, I sense _black_ coming from my mind and _white_ from my vessel, mixing and forming _blue_ of all things. And, threading through it like blood in water, something _red._

I follow its connection down, and...

A demon, of sorts. Bloody wonderful. And I thought having a piece of Dark Lord in your skull was bad. This unlucky kid takes the cake. At least I know where the ears and... and tail, comes from now. Then again, perhaps such a thing is normal for this dimension. I cannot dare to hazard a guess.

I stare into my reflection with a narrowed gaze. My eyes catch themselves and I incant a single word. I Legilimize myself, shifting through a horrible parody of a cinematic reel.

I understand, now. The Veil shreds the body in the Void between worlds, but the Soul is ethereal, incorporeal. It bleeds through the rift, mindlessly seeking something that can relate to it. This kid, this... Naruto, his five years of life is like a cruel mockery of my own. Somehow, actually, it's worse.

Oh, the home life is similar enough. But whereas I could delude myself into thinking every kid has to go through... _this,_ Naruto could see every day that he's the only one of his neighbors going through hell. On top of that, rather than being the "good" kind of famous like me (though I've never claimed my fame was in any way, shape, or form "good") he is apparently the "bad" kind of famous. Infamous. Probably to do with the energy monster in his- mine- _our_ gut.

Luckily, years of storing magic in my soul has granted it interesting side effects. My mind has left an imprint on it, from years of sending commands to it like it would any other organ. Upon merging and melding with Naruto's, this imprint pressed itself against the mind once more. But unless I make... changes, such a surge of control would only be temporary.

_Sorry, kid._

Canceling the Legilimency, I flare magic into my very brain and begin the arduous process that is hardcore Occlumency. The brain shifts, reorienting itself, and bleeds as my Metamorphic talent mixes with the Mind Arts and young, five-year-old Uzumaki Naruto's mind transforms into weary, twenty-five-year-old Rose Potter-Black's mind.

I flush a steady flow of healing and regenerative magic into my brain and thank Nature for seeing fit to leave the mind itself blessedly, gloriously free of pain receptors and nerve endings. Had I not done this, the shock of finding itself with a magical soul tag-a-long would've worn away and the native essence would retake control. For all my experience, this is Naruto's body first and foremost. His mind, his command.

For a second I contemplate if this counts as murder or not. Shrugging, I absorb the remnants of his soul and decide he can live vicariously through me. His life was shitty enough anyway, I doubt he would complain.

Turning my attention back to the mirror, I begin pulsing my magic throughout my entire body, being careful to thoroughly ignore the faux-magic circulatory system.

My father had been the son of a Black, and Blacks are renowned for carrying the recessive Metamorph gene. (Not really, as it was a mutation in their magical core rather than actual genetics, but close enough.) My mother had been a muggleborn, meaning her soul was "fresh" and clean of the corrupting influence of centuries of pureblood inbreeding, father included. They combined to awaken my Metamorphic talent, which was only strengthened by the appearance of a Slytherin's soul, which has trace Black ancestry.

The same thing happened to Tonks; minus the fragment of Dark Lord, anyways.

Unlike popular belief, a Metamorph's bodily manipulations are permanent. There is no "base" or "real" form. What changes we make are there to stay (well, until we change them again).

Bones shift and grow, muscles contract and enlarge, features shift and traits recreate themselves. I silently thank Tonks' memory for shoving all those anatomy and biology books at me all those years ago. Otherwise I would have surely fucked this up. Magic and intuition can only take me so far.

Finishing after nearly an hour of non-stop work, I come to the realization that I should have fallen unconscious from magical exhaustion half an hour ago. Aging a hungry body from the age of five to a healthy, five foot nine seventeen year old takes a helluva lot of energy. Frowning, I once again cast my new favorite diagnostic spell to seek enlightenment.

I come to the rapid conclusion that the weird black energy surrounding my brain is an exact match for magic. Except, instead of pooling in a carefully sculpted void in the soul (the truth of a magical core) where ambient energy can utilize osmosis to gradually refill a witch's reserves, the energy attracts itself to or, perhaps, is generated by the mind and eventually melds with the white energy.

Humming, I run through dozens of various theories as to the nature of magic and cross each of them out. Eventually, only one explanation remains.

Like the Chinese believed, there are apparently two energies: physical and mental/spiritual, yang and yin. Back home, we wizards pool latent "magic" into our souls and harness it as spiritual energy. We then manipulate it with our minds, using a medium: usually a wand, a trinket, or a staff, which are conductors for physical energy. They combine, creating an effect. (I assume, in times of stress or through long practice and diligence, we can transform spiritual energy into physical and combine them inefficiently through sheer willpower. Hence, accidental and wandless magic. Or, you can be like me, and have the Elder Wand fused directly into your soul through being the Mistress of Death. The ultimate hack.)

Which means I apparently have a leg-up over the denizens of this realm, having not only this body's natural network but a witch's core. Plus, the... _thing... _in my gut. Here's to hoping it will keep me from yet another early grave.

My new superhuman senses catch an echo in the dark. I shift through my mind, rapidly threading through the knowledge of this world I assimilated during my self Legilimizing. Five years of exposure to the local language centers itself in the forefront of my mind.

Still, memorizing verbs and nouns and transitive clauses will do me nothing without practice. So when the elderly orphanage matron with a scowl on her face and a lantern in her hands approaches me, I Conjure a flowing, traditional set of dark witch's robes around my seventeen year old and slender form. Thick raven hair cascades down my waist in lazy waves. Shining Killing Curse eyes twinkle at the shocked and backpedaling crone. The silver-tipped, vulpine raven ears and tail let her know _exactly_ how fucked she is.

It wasn't difficult to fall back into my ruthless, kill-or-be-killed mindset from the days of the Second Blood War. Smirking, I raised a single hand.

"I... hate..." I spoke slowly, whispering this Elemental language. "... scum like you."

With a flick of my wrist, a wandless Banishment twists and breaks her neck, and she falls to the floor already a lifeless corpse.

A ruthlessness born through years of starvation and honed on the bloody battlefield is my most terrifying trait. At least, so says the Light and Dark fools who dare stand in my way on my path to murdering the Dark Lord. I adhere to neither of these confining and petty philosophies.

Salazar said it best: _"there is no good nor evil, only power and those too weak to seek it." _And while I was no Slytherin, lacking the required ambition, this 'Claw had the cunning in spades. My mind was the quickest in the School, sharpened through necessity.

And I've always possessed a... _flexible_ moral code. It is one of my better qualities.

As such, I held no qualms stepping smoothly over the matron's corpse and Legilimizing her brutally. The mind had yet to degenerate, so it was laughably easy.

I ignored the countless memories of her physically, mentally, and emotionally abusing the "demon brat" and instead assimilated her decades of knowledge on the workings of this world. Humming a song from the Weird Sisters, I began to skip down the passageway.

I had a godfather to find.

* * *

_**A/N: **Well. That was a thing. I'm going to hide, now._


	2. Welcome To T&I

_**Disclaimer: **I own nothing. I'm just a poor boy, I need no sympathy, because I'm easy come, easy go, a little high, a little low, any way the wind blows... I forget the rest._

* * *

**Whispers In The Dark**

**~ And Other Morally Reprehensible Things ~**

**by Rozen Krone**

**Introduction: Welcome To Torture And Interrogation**

_Feathers' Book of Songs_

_ [chp. 17, "Spell Combinations and Chains," pg. 141, "the Mind Meld."]_

_ Spell One: Legilimens (Mind-Delving Charm); Rank: Master_

_ Spell Two: Compulso (The Compulsion Charm); Rank: Novice_

_ Summary: "The Mind Meld" is a combination technique where usage of the Mind Arts can temporarily superpower the novice Compulsion Charm. By sinking the caster's focus deep into the target's subconscious, the usual simplicity that is the Compulsion Charm can be used to rewrite the desires, goals, ambitions, emotions, attachments, and even personality of the target on a whim._

_ Pointers: True, insidious use of the Mind Meld combination technique takes from five to thirty five minutes, depending on the quantity and quality of the Melding. Through usage of stealth charms (chp. 9, "Stealth Charms and Artifacts") one can apply the needed change in a public place without being spotted. This is highly useful for ease of access._

_ Requirements: High degree of skill with the Offensive Mind Art. Constant eye contact for the duration of the spell._

_ Note: "The Mind Meld worked yesterday. Undersecretary Umbridge finally pushed me off the edge during class, though of course I let no one know. Engaged target during dinner under the Cloak, a Muffling Charm, and a Scent-Blocker. Umbridge is now a creatures' rights fanatic, although she will maintain a facade of a pureblood supremacist for two years or until I rework the Compulsion._

_ "I learned that she is in charge of all the bribes Minister Fudge accepts. She will now divert those galleons along with the Minister's personal coffers into a proxy account for me to liberate. However, diverting all of the money into the same account would be suspicious. The other half will go to Saint Timothy's Fund for Orphaned and Needy Muggleborn Children."_

* * *

Legilimency is, and always has been, my single most favorite talent.

I was able to score Outstandings on all of my NEWTs despite never once studying by Legilimizing all of my Ravenclaw yearmates. To this day they never found out how I had so much free time.

As perhaps one of maybe four Masters of the Mind Arts in all of Wizarding Britain, I am familiar with all the faults in the spell. Such as the requirement for eye contact. I'm also, however, familiar with the lesser known perks of the spell, such as the ability to place Compulsions halfway through a Legilimizing so deep into the subconscious that one's very personality and hard-set beliefs can be rewritten on a whim.

But more on that later.

The Elder Wand isn't the only Hallow infused into my soul. With a thought I vanish like dust in the wind. I become a ghost, not only invisible but intangible as well, incorporeal. Death himself cannot touch me.

I had always wondered why my Cloak never seemed to have any special effects. Other than its supernatural shelf life, it was not at all superior to a common, ragged Demiguise hair cloak. Even a Disillusionment Charm was superior. The Stone was the same, having no practical use. The Wand, while potent, wasn't anything to worry over either; even after claiming it from the Dark Lord, I still preferred my holly and phoenix feather.

So what, I wondered, could make these Hallows legends of over a thousand years?

I stalked through the winding streets of the Hidden Leaf, walking right through the crowd, phasing through the blissfully ignorant citizenry. Humans, buildings, stands, shinobi, I walk right through all and sundry and none are aware of so much as my existance.

I can't keep it up forever, of course. I'm Death's champion, not Death herself. But for a solid two minutes maximum I might as well be one with the wind.

Those with an intelligent spark in their eyes, or pouches of blunted kunai strapped to their sides, are subjected to my Legilimency. After thirty seconds I know more about these Elemental Nations than I ever did about Britain.

I slip into an alleyway and sever the connection between myself and the Cloak. Only half a minute passed since I activated it and I'm already down a quarter further of magical power. Even with the second pool of spiritual energy I now have at my beck and call, I cannot last long drawing upon the ancient artifact. Unlike before my ascension as Mistress of Death, the new Cloak is more suited for short bursts.

I shake my head to clear it of such thoughts before Conjuring a shaft of wood and incanting the Four-Point Charm. The stick keeps spinning. Progressively stronger and stronger Dowsing Charms are chanted nigh inaudibly as I try to divine the location of Sirius Black.

It seems to me that Sirius, despite his lack of talent for the Mind Arts, has maintained some level of awareness in his new body. Idly I wonder if he merged with his vessel, developed as a split personality, or completely overtaken the poor sap who's lived a life akin to the Black reject. How else could he erect anti-Dowsing Wards?

Still, a particularly insidious spell I picked up in Japan during my three-year holiday after the War finally manifests results. A Disillusionment Charm, coupled with a Muffling Charm and a Scent-Blocker enshroud my form. I scale the building side with dexterous grace and begin my trek out of the village proper.

I repress the urge to Legilimize the shinobi roof-hopping all around me. None of the civilians whose mind I've walked through knew of any ninja version of the Mind Arts, nor has the lower-level shinobi-in-training in the streets below, but I'm not taking any chances with these obviously stronger ninja. Being overly cautious never hurt anyone.

I arrive on the outskirts of a massive compound. I recast the Japanese Dowsing Charm, just to double check. There's no doubt about it. Sirius is in here.

While I wait for sundown I thread through all of the data and tidbits of information I picked up from my Legilimency spree. All of the information was in my mind already, yes, but I hadn't understood much of it yet. The theory was similar to a USB memory drive plugged into a computer; there and waiting but having yet to be downloaded. I needed time to sort through it, else it'd act like baggage and slow down my whirring thought processes.

Still, the data is useful. Knowledge is power. And if I'm going to hunt my Dark Lord, I'm going to need all of the power I can get.

* * *

The sun flees and the Hidden Leaf is bathed in darkness. Like a thief in the night – which I am, I mockingly realized – I activate my Cloak and bleed through the walls like a ghost. The compound is like a maze to me. Luckily I can cheat and make my way to my godfather the way a crow flies.

Before long I arrive in a dark bedroom. It takes me a moment to realize this, as the decorations are both somewhat spartan and austere, and the bed is covered by a hanging curtain. I look around, only mildly surprised to notice the walls done up in a bloody Gryffindor red. I erect dozens of Muffling Wards, Notice-Me-Nots, and Obscuring Charms for privacy. My godfather has a habit of squealing like a little girl when I wake him up. While funny, I'd rather not be chased out of the Leaf by one of the village's strongest Clans.

I still don't know how shinobi stack up to wizards. From what I've seen so far, they assuredly lack a wizard's compunctions about killing. I'm not sure if I should be relieved about this or not. On one hand, they won't be as irritatingly naive as the Light had been during the Second Blood War, and they could make strong allies. On the other, the more killing power available in this world, the stronger the Dark Lord has grown in the years since his arrival. I might have difficulties catching up.

I shove my musings to the back of my mind. I can hash out the details with a confidante later.

I flick a light Banisher at my sleeping godfather – not much, just enough to give him a scare – and blink when nothing happens. My mind whirs as I attempt to divine the still resting shinobi's apparent immunity to the spell. It had worked on the matron, and the only difference between the two should be shinobi training.

And nothing in my Legilimizing alluded to practiced immunity to instant spells or attacks. And even civilians have chakra, so it can't be that.

Blinking, I realize that's probably it, actually. Larger and larger quantities of chakra, or chakra control as the case may be, may provide a resilience to instant rather than physical spells. It would explain why the weaker Dowsing Charms fizzled out when aimed at the shinobi in front of me.

Which means I would need a much more powerful Banisher if I want to shove Sirius around. And as fun as it may be, I don't feel comfortable aiming such a powerful Hex at the only family I've ever had, minus Tonks.

Still, this theory only applies to instant spells, like Banishers, Summoners, Vanishers, and Levicorpus. Ray, Mist, and other physical spells like the Iron-Shackler should still work just fine.

To test this theory, I fire off a moderate Aguamenti at my sleeping godfather. For science, of course. The wizard is soaked and forcefully shoved off the bed and onto the floor.

I repress a snicker. I want to see what Sirius Black has been doing all this time.

_"Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique!" _The air in front of his gaping maw flickers and ignites, manifesting a surprisingly large sphere of red-hot flames. I watch in amusement as it spirals towards me, intent on incinerating me. Seems like Sirius finally got over his Dumbledore-inspired battlefield mercy. Which makes sense, since if he hadn't been throwing Stunners around he would never have been forced through the Veil by Bellatrix in the first place.

I activate the Cloak, having no space to run in an enclosed space such as this. The flames phase right through me. White light flashes throughout the room, blinding in its intensity. It is almost enough to cover my godfather's bold leap right at me, obviously planning a straight up Taijutsu match. His eyes flicker red, triple tomoe spinning dangerously.

I disrupt the Cloak, knowing I can't launch an offensive with it active, nor can I maintain the severe magic drain required for more than forty seconds or so after my trek through the compound and the Metamorph'ing hours previous.

With Sirius gaining on me with speed he never had back in England, I realize I need to fight back before he breaks my neck. A wave of my hand Transfigures his clothing into a raiment of venomous snakes, fangs frothing with paralyzing venom. A Compulsion makes sure they avoid the neck, face, and crotch. I'd rather not kill him or piss him off to much.

I'm only mildly surprised when he flies through a set of handseals and explodes into a burst of white-hot flame. The serpents are incinerated instantly. A moment later the flame dies away, leaving a naked Sirius Black. Still, his breathing is labored and his movements sluggish, and I see two distinct bite marks on his body, showing me my trademark Transfiguration paid off.

He vanishes in a swirl of wind and reappears behind me. I recognize the technique: the Body Flicker, one of the rare techniques every shinobi knows of, along with the Academy Three. I'm surprised, as I also divined from my Legilimizing that it is both chakra draining and lacking in accuracy, making it lack combat viability. Of course, conventional wisdom never meant anything to Sirius Black.

He strikes out with a lightning fast punch. Of course, I never had any intention of actually fighting him, so I catch it. It hurts, but with his fist in my palm I can fire off a point blank Stunner without hope for evasion. He falls to the floor unconscious.

I laugh, waving my hand and repairing the room. I leave the burns on the wall so he can always remember how he lost.

I Levitate him, only to remember it won't work. I'm surprised when it actually does work. I shake my head, deciding to worry over a shinobi's apparent selective immunity to magic at a later date. Sirius is released on his bed, and I force him to stay there with a Sticking Charm.

An Enervate bleeds from my fingertips, the red light flashing in the dark. I follow it up with a Werelight, the floating orb illuminating my godfather's room, casting long, creeping shadows across the walls. Lastly, I Conjure a highly comfortable, plush chair, albeit not as garishly coloured as Dumbledore liked to make his.

Sirius awakens, sees me, _recognizes_ me, and it's like a dam broke. He breaks free from the Sticking Charm – somehow – and tackles me. I sigh, stroking his raven hair as he cries, and try not to join in.

Forty minutes pass and Sirius Black, exhausted, falls asleep. I tuck him into bed in a rare moment of tenderness. Still, I ransack his bedroom for some cash. I'm his goddaughter, I have the right.

Taking one last look at my godfather, I make my escape. The only sign of my presence is the parchment tacked to the door, the burns on the walls, and the tear tracks on Sirius Black's face.

* * *

I arrive at one of the more distinguished apartment complexes in the Leaf's very own Red Light District.

I find myself pleasantly unsurprised when I realized that the race of man that calls this dimension home, while far more physically able than my own, have nigh identical psyches. The existence of such a District even in a Hidden Village like this sets me at ease, reminding me that this new world isn't so different after all. I find myself amused that locating such a den of sin, and so quickly, no less, sets my mind at ease. Wonder what that says about me?

Not that I particularly care, beyond the entertainment factor alone, of course.

And so I slip through the back door window. A nifty variant of the Extrasensory Charm grants me the talent for seeing heat signatures even through walls, and within moments I sneak through the employee break room, round the washroom's corner, across the lobby, and into a sleek if cheap office.

I spare a glance to analyze the business front of the owner's quarters. Habit and learned pragmatism alone has me cataloguing and then ignoring every last detail, before at last turning towards a thrice-locked door; a door I can sense leaking this... chakra. It is quite well-protected, and I don't require a diagnostic spell to tell me how difficult it'd be to unlock. Too bad for my latest target no mortal defense can best the Cloak and the mind of the Mistress of Death.

And so I phase directly through the wall beside it.

Looming above the sleeping and still blissfully unaware civilian, I almost lazily wave a hand over his face. A flash of red light ensures the mortal won't be awakening until I give my say-so. Cracking his eyelid open with a single finger, I enter his mind with the ease of long practice, and delve deeper... and deeper... and ever deeper. Soon, I find myself at the core of his being, the depths of his subconscious mind; the closest even I can get to the soul.

_"Obey,"_ I command him, lacing a Compulsion into my telepathic words. _"Obey me, the Mistress of Death."_

* * *

I miss my coffee.

Hermione Granger, perhaps the only Gryffindor in my year I don't hate with a burning passion to rival a thousand suns, brought some with her fourth year. She let me try some during my all-nighters before the first trial after she saw me sleeping in the library early some Saturday morning. _"You can't keep Enervating yourself like that, Rose,"_ I remember her telling me. _"It's not healthy."_ Of course, hooking me on coffee was even less healthy, so her brilliant plan somewhat backfired.

That was the year I learned the heaven that is owl-order forms. Coffee, muggle candy, pencils, you name it, some enterprising muggleborn is selling it.

If I had known the Elemental Nations didn't have coffee, I would've just laughed and let Voldemort destroy it. A world without coffee is a world not worth saving. I'm used to a certain standard of living, and this isn't cutting it.

I was halfway through working out a delusional plan to Enthrall some shopkeeper to reinvent coffee for my drinking pleasure when my godfather arrived. He waved the server over, ordered a green tea (of all things), and turned to me with a piercing gaze.

"Yo." I gave a two-fingered wave, tapping out "_call me Feathers" _in the Marauders' code on the table. I kick back, relaxing my knee-high boots against the table.

"It's really you," he whispered, before giving me the most honest, happy smile I have ever seen on his face; even if this new face of his is new to me. "What happened?"

"It's an, ah, a long story, Sirius..." I smile sheepishly. I thread long fingers through my raven locks, hair like spiders' thread. (Is it weird, taking pride in hair I can grow out and change color and hue of on a whim? I've always chalked it up to some long buried vanity, some urge to rebel against Madam Petunia that _I'm not ugly,_ but I don't know.)

"Shisui," he cuts in with a similar smile, knocking me from my thoughts. "I go by Uchiha Shisui, now."

"And how's that working out for you?" I reply with an easy smile on my features, and realize with a start that I've smiled more since diving through the Veil of Death yesterday than in the last three years combined. It is not a pleasant realization. "You're neither a metamorph nor an Occlumens."

"I am too an Occlumens," he huffed with mock pride. "Just not as crazy good at it as you are." He paused. "It was... difficult, at first. It was like having a split personality, but being the voice inside someone else's head. It was... weird... letting someone else have the body's reigns, but of course it wasn't my body in the first place, so..."

"I can imagine," I smirked, even if his casual admittance of not being the same man as my godfather pierced something inside me. "Did Sirius and Shisui reach an accord?"

His lips twitched into a crooked smile. "Got it in one. Next near death experience that came around, we... merged, so to speak. Now I'm both Shisui and Sirius. More Shisui, though. Sirius, he..." my godfather sighed. "After Azkaban, he- I- whatever. Azkaban just sucked, you know? This is my second chance." He shook his head. "What about you?"

"Some five year old kid named Uzumaki Naruto," I began, only to stop when Sir- _Shisui_ - and isn't that like a sucker punch to the gut? - winced. "You know him, then?"

"Everybody does. He's the vessel of the Nine-Tails Fox."

I raised an eyebrow. "I'm aware of that. What I _didn't_ know was that it was apparently common knowledge outside of the orphanage."

"You know about the S-Class secret aspect of it, then?"

"When I first got here yesterday, I ran around under the Cloak Legilimizing people- don't give me that look, Black- so I know the basics of this world. Having trouble with the language though. Speaking of, should I erect a Muffling Charm?"

"No need," Shisui waved me off. "Everyone speaks the same language, so it doesn't even have a name. Anyone trying to eavesdrop will just think we're speaking code, which is true enough, considering we're the only people who speak English here." He paused, as if remembering something. "So those ears I saw yesterday..."

"Those were real," I smirked in amusement, discretely casting an Auditory Illusory Charm _anyways,_ one that would obscure our words and replace them with a conversation about bird-watching. And in Elemental, too. I've gotten rather good at the language, considering I found myself in this dimension yesterday. "Got a tail to match, as well. They're covered up in some basic Illusions and Notice-Me-Nots, at the moment. Though you could probably flash your oh-so-famous eyes at me and see all my secrets."

Sirius just grinned roguishly, which looked so foreign on his harsh and aristocratic features that I couldn't help but look away. "You can't hide from these eyes, sweetheart."

"Whatever," I rolled my emerald greens. "Anyways, Uzumaki Naruto is basically this world's me, but in reverse. My soul overpowered his on accident." Which was a lie, but Shisui died long before the war hit its climax, and I'd rather he not know how dark and twisted I've become. Yet, anyways. It's a given he'll figure it out eventually. But never let it be said I'm not a coward. (Is it so wrong to wish for simpler days?) "Anyways, I Metamorph'ed myself back to my old form and went looking for you. Did you set up any anti-Dowsing Wards, perchance?"

"No, I haven't. Why?"

"Just something I've noticed. Most of my tracking spells completely failed to locate you. Then, before I woke you up, my Banisher just fizzled out. But after you were, ah... knocked out... my Levitation Charm worked just fine." I thought it would be wise not to mention the orphanage matron I callously murdered or the apartment complex owner I Enslaved to my will. "Might be troublesome. You know what's up with that?"

"Awareness? Willpower? Chakra levels?" He shook his head. He then took a long draught from his tea, thinking. It was rare, these moments of thought, but for all his immature attitude never let it be said that Sirius Black was an idiot. "Here. Legilimize me."

I did. A mere moment later I was shoved ruthlessly out of his mind, left reeling with a killer migraine. I groaned, Enervating myself before downing half of Shisui's horrid green tea.

"Didn't work, huh?"

"No shit, Sherlock." I ignored his amused laugh with all the ease of someone long spent suffering from the Weasley Twins' pranks. "You been working on your Occlumency?"

"Nope," he grinned. "Here. Try again."

"Fuck you," I replied. Still, I dove back in. It only took a moment to establish contact, whereupon I immediately left, not wanting to see the kinds of things my godfather gets into when I wasn't around. "Success. What changed?"

"I willed it," he replied, shrugging. "Just a theory, though."

I waved my hand, giving him permission to continue. He hummed.

"Obviously, there's no Occlumency involved, as I can't really remember how to do it in the first place, to be honest." He shrugged unrepentantly. "The first time, I didn't want to let you enter my mind, so my chakra refused you access. Second time, I gave you silent permission, so you entered just fine. Did any of the civilians offer you trouble?"

"Not a one," I replied honestly. "Not even some of the trainee shinobi. Although, I only Legilimized a few. Not the greatest sample size to make sweeping generalizations with."

"As I thought," Shisui nodded. "Civilians aren't as... in tune, with their chakra. Hell, they don't have much more than the minimum necessity for living." He hummed. "Seems to me like willpower and chakra take the place of Occlumency barriers."

"And the instant spells? Levitation Charms, Banishers, and the like? Both times you were asleep, yet, different results."

"You succeeded in Levitating me after I was knocked out, you said?" When I nodded, he continued. "Right. Well, being knocked out and being asleep are two very different things. A loud enough noise, a bright enough light, a near enough presence will all wake me up if I'm asleep. Semi-awareness, Itachi-senpai called it. But after that Stunner I wasn't getting up come hell or high water. Or, apparently, an Enervation."

I nodded my head, deferring to his experience. Shisui may not have been the brains behind the Marauders, but he could duel Bellatrix to a standstill, and knew the little things about magic I've never picked up being muggle-raised. Plus, I sacrificed my pride years ago for power, so I didn't suffer deferring to his experience. I blinked, then, something he said resonating in me. "Itachi-senpai? That name sounds familiar."

"It should," he replied, some lingering sense of pride flashing in his Uchiha black eyes. It was... off, seeing coal black where I expect a stormy gray. "Uchiha clan heir, Uchiha Itachi. ANBU, prodigy, and all that rot."

"Mm-hmm," I hummed noncommitedly. Shisui tried to shrug it off, but I could see right through him. He had that look in his eyes, like young parents the day their little girl graduated preschool. It was adorable and mildly terrifying all at the same time, and I tried _really hard_ not to be jealous, I swear. But the urge to hunt down and _Avada Kedavra_ 'Itachi-senpai' never went away. "Anyways, I can tell you're just dying to ask me something. What is it?"

"Why are you here?" It comes off harsher than he expected, but he's quick to backpedal. "Sorry, I just mean, the only way here I know of is through the Veil, and, well..."

I sighed. "Don't know how long it's been on your end, but for me it's been ten years. The Dark Lord split his soul seven ways, making seven horcruxes in all, for a total of eight if you count the original. Hufflepuff's chalice, Ravenclaw's diadem, Slytherin's locket, the Gaunt family ring – better known as the Resurrection Stone – his childhood diary, his familiar snake, and, ah, me." I smiled mirthlessly. "To summarize a very, _very _long story, I got them all, even the fragment hidden in me. All of them except for that _fucking_ diadem."

"... What happened next?"

"Last ditch effort. He launched an attack on the Ministry after I... retook control... of his Imperious'ed puppets. Somehow made our way right back into the Department of Mysteries. I faked an injury, he got arrogant, I slung an overpowered Banisher at his kisser and he was sent hurtling through the Veil. It was... anticlimactic, you know? I was expecting fireworks. All I got was silence."

"Fuck, Rose," Shisui sighed, visibly aged at the prospect of the Dark Lord fucking things up _again. _"Worry about Voldemort later. What happened next? Did Moony settle down? Tonks? Andi? Dumbledore still Headmaster and a thousand other titles? I've been worrying over this shit for the last year, kid."

I swallowed thickly, unable to catch his eye.

"Rose...?" He shook his head. "It's not good, is it?"

"Let's just say, when I heard the Dark Lord was kicking it in an alternate dimension, I swandived through the Veil of Death to get rid of that _fucking _silence."

* * *

I lie on my back, curled up in the filthy dirt, half-naked three miles away from the Leaf clutching my chest in pain.

I'm wearing naught but a loose pair of linen underclothes and a raggedy tunic, torn from branches and sporting a layer of tree sap, dirt, sticky blood, and grass stains. My beloved hair was ripped up as if I fed the once-silky smooth locks to a paper shredder. The excess amount of visible skin was covered in a criss-cross mesh lattice-work of scars and yellowing bruises. Those were newer, timed perfectly to still show when the ANBU patrol arrived right about...

...now. ANBU Weasel makes a flurry of handsigns before speaking lowly to his partner, a brown-haired Mouse-masked shinobi I fail to recognize. He then forms a Shadow Clone to carry me and returns to the Leaf post haste.

And, despite knowing the situation, I can't help but rage at Shisui in the helpless confines of my own mind for putting me in this situation.

_I was engrossed in a journeyman's guide to chakra theory I stole from some unsuspecting Academy Student. I was kicked back on my feather mattress, ignoring the ray of sunlight that snuck through the window and struck me right in the eyes, suffering from the rare form of academic overfocus that plagues all Ravenclaws. _

_ My apartment bedroom managed the unique kind of messy clean that is only possible to create by using magic for all your chores without actually getting out of bed. I didn't mind, seeing as I spent the last three weeks either visiting Shisui, reading books, or both at the same time, and as such cared little for trivial housework._

_ I sighed despondently for the hundredth time that all the good ninjas wouldn't let me ransack their minds. Then I wouldn't have to read books for knowledge like the rest of the mortals. I could just kick back and let others do all the heavy lifting and hard work for me. It worked during Hogwarts, I mused, letting me get away with my more esoteric studies, so why shouldn't it work now?_

_ Shisui, who likewise was attempting to read a scroll on Fire Release Techniques but rather reveling in the renewed camaraderie with his goddaughter, finally decided to break the silence. "So..." he began, drawing the word out. "What are we going to do about you?"_

_ "What do you mean?"_

_ "You can't go around claiming you're Uzumaki Naruto, everyone thinks he either ran away or was kidnapped. And he's five years old. And a dude. Plus, it'd just bring all sorts of unwanted attention down on our heads."_

_ "You've got a plan, though, Padfoot?"_

_ "Of course I do," he scoffed. "You'll need power to kill Voldemort, which means we have to make you a kunoichi. The way I see it, we have only so many choices. The first would be for you to morph back into a kid, show up at the orphanage with some new name and try for the Academy."_

_ "And waste my time around arrogant little shits for the next four to six years? I'm twenty five, Shisui."_

_ "Thought so, which means that plan's out." He waved his hand airily. "As I had predicted, of course. The next would be to Legilimize and Enthrall some of the top brass, get them to slip you through the system. I read about the Mind Meld in that little Grimoire of yours, Rose." He heard my snicker and rolled his eyes. "Yeah, not even you could get away with that, and that's ignoring my soul screaming about betraying my Village."_

_ "Got anything else?" I asked._

_ "How good are you at Occlumency?"_

_ "Good enough to hide information even from myself."_

_ "Perfect," Shisui grinned. "The Yamanaka are more combat-focused with their Mind-Walking Techniques, you should be more than a match for Inoichi-san."_

_ "Who?"_

_ He smirked. "He works for Torture and Interrogation. Come on, you'll love this plan."_

I did not, in fact, love this plan. Every moment I was cradled bridal style in the arms of _"Itachi-senpai's"_ clone was another moment I spent plotting Shisui's brutal death.

Yeah. I'm a jealous bitch.

I clutched my fox's tail to my chest with all the single-minded devotion of a toddler seeking comfort. I tried to avoid the stares of what shinobi were still up and about in the middle of the night and instead worked on my Occlumency.

All too soon I had hidden the vast majority of my memories under a hazy cloud of magic which, after extensive study alongside Shisui, we determined to be nigh undetectable to even a sensor (or so we theorized.) Even if magic could be caught by the Sensory Arts, the spiritual energy that surrounds the mind _anyways _should be more than enough to enshroud it. I also regulated my thoughts under a series of strict guidelines, as Shisui didn't really know how invasive Inoichi-san's Techniques are going to be, and I didn't feel comfortable relying on my English thoughts to hide my musings. If I picked up the Elemental language in hours, I theorized, I wasn't taking the chance that the Yamanaka couldn't do the same in reverse; plus, it would tip him off to a foreign presence in a five-year-old native's mind. Which means I'll have to _think_ in Elemental, which even for me is a difficult task to manage.

_Itachi-senpai _(I will never not be a bitch about that) didn't carry me to the hospital or infirmary, although I didn't expect him to. His partner - Mouse - ran off to explain the situation to the Sandaime Hokage while Weasel and his clone arced towards the T&I Department.

I didn't watch. I clutched my tail tighter in genuine terror. I may have been the Dark Lord's single greatest enemy, after the old man's death, but unlike Tom Riddle I wasn't a magical powerhouse with no mortal fears. I made more of an impact in the war than anyone else because I wasn't afraid to shed blood, sweat, and tears for my achievements, and what I couldn't achieve through elbow grease and poison I stole with my Legilimency. Mad-Eye Moody once told me that four out of every five duels are won by the side that's not afraid to go all out, and I am _never _afraid to bleed my enemies.

And even that wasn't enough. Like Hermione, Bellatrix Lestrange got her filthy dagger on me. For days I rubbed my scar with increasingly more acidic soaps until Luna had to restrain me. Not even my Metamorph'ic talent could get the word _Traitor_ seared into my skin off of me. It only further propelled my vanity, taking increasingly more beautiful forms as if to distance myself from the helplessness I've felt in my more mundane skin.

Twice since my fall through the Veil of Death I woke up in a cold sweat rubbing the smooth, flawless skin where that word once lay etched like an engraving, a mark of possession.

It was a subconscious thing. Associative memories. Madame Petunia always made me morph my form into something horrid to make herself feel better, although it didn't make the abuse hurt any less. Bellatrix had been the same. Was it a surprise, then, that once I clawed my way towards freedom I would refuse to be anything less than flawlessly beautiful?

I don't know when I start to shake. It only makes the Uchiha prodigy run faster.

We pass through hallway after hallway, taking what seems to me like a needlessly complicated route deeper into the underground complex, but I know it's the fastest way. The Torture and Interrogation department, like most of the shinobi buildings in the Leaf, were constructed like mazes to confuse escapees and infiltrators. It's an understandable and logical choice. Doesn't make it any less irritating.

Itachi eventually carries me bridal style into what is labeled _Interrogation & Extraction Room 401. _The, to be blunt, torture chamber is entirely black save for the single flickering lightbulb hanging by a thread in the center of the room. The moderately sized interrogation room is empty save for a sleek, metallic table in the corner and The Chair in the far side of the room.

I...don't quite know how to explain it. We didn't have contraptions quite like it back in Wizarding Britain. It reminds me of the shackled throne Igor Karkaroff was bound to in Dumbledore's memory, but different. Rather than an actual chair, this invention is more like a slab of cold iron arched at a forty five degree angle.

Itachi presses me none too gently to The Chair, holding me high enough that my bare feet are nine or ten inches off the ground. He sticks me to the torture contraption with what I assume to be a variation of the basic chakra exercise Leaf Sticking. He then binds me to the table with no less than twelve lashes and belts welded into the contraption. I can feel my chakra draining from me by the Seals etched into The Chair at a prodigious rate. Thank the Baron my magic isn't affected, or I wouldn't be able to maintain my Occlumency.

I wonder if he'll administer basic first-aid at the least, before realizing this is a military dictatorship and they probably wouldn't care if I lived or died, had it not been for the tail and ears marking my relation to the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki and, thus, a Konoha problem. (Of course he wouldn't bother healing me first. As roughed up as I am, I'll break all the easier.)

Itachi leaves, then, to go do whatever Uchiha's do in their spare time.

Time passes weird in that dark torture chamber. The only way I can measure it is with the pacing of my breath and the healing of my wounds. Had it been under any other circumstances, I probably would have been fascinated watching the augmented healing process. As is, all I feel is mildly sick.

Shisui and I could only detail out this plan so far. It's been around a month, now, since Uzumaki Naruto disappeared alongside the Vanished corpse of the orphanage matron. No doubt they believed I had been either assassinated and disposed of or, worse (in their opinion), abducted and raised an enemy of the Leaf.

The hope is that, when it becomes clear I suffer from "amnesia," they'll think I was taken and experimented on. It would explain the shapeshifting, advanced mind, and whatever powers I decide to bust out in the future.

Shisui didn't think they would hurt me _too_ much. They don't want to alienate their Jinchuuriki, after all. I disagreed. After ten years under the Dursleys, my faith in the human race is rather low. I wouldn't be surprised at all if they try to break me so they can recreate me anew. Fuck. I'd probably do the same if I were in their place. Anything for the power to massacre my enemies.

So I'm not surprised at all when my interrogator comes in with a sadistic grin and a case of scalpels, knives, vials of poison, and other tools of the torturer's trade. Nor am I surprised when her greeting reaches my vulpine ears.

"Well aren't we just the most adorable thing? My name is Mitarashi Anko. I'm sure we'll have _fun_ together."

I am a little surprised when I whimper in genuine terror. I am so killing Shisui if I make it out of here.

* * *

**_A/N: _**_Enter stage left, Anko! I thought long and hard how I wanted the two to meet, and my favorite idea was on opposite sides of the torturer's table. Isn't it romantic? Considering how fucked up I've been making Potter-Black, I can totally see her having the hots for her torturer. She's a masochist, definitely. Can't you tell? And I don't hate Itachi. I love him, actually. But Rose is a possessive little bitch, so she doesn't like anyone who takes her godfather's time from her. There's a deeper meaning, but that won't be revealed for a bit. Cheers._


	3. Welcome To The Black Ops

_**Disclaimer: **I own nothing. I own even less than nothing, now, after a trip to the hospital and repurchasing of a computer left my wallet dry and the next twenty thousand words of this story lost to the Void. Hence, the ten-week forced hiatus, and dropping of River Runs Deep. I don't even have a snappy quote to make this disclaimer worth the twenty seconds of your life it just wasted._

* * *

**Whispers In The Dark**

**~ And Other Morally Reprehensible Things ~**

**by Rozen Krone**

**Introduction: Welcome To The Black Ops**

_I dashed forwards, acceleration so ridiculously extreme not even I could see myself, and in a single, fluid motion I buried my blade up to the hilt in my enemy's gut._

_ Unsheathing my mother's blade from the cage of blood and flesh, I pressed the heel of my boot on the masked figure's chest and pushed off. The cadaver landed on the slick rock with a dying scream and a sickening thud but I had already written it off. I then looked around the apocalyptic battlefield with the sort of controlled wildness that only war experience and adrenaline can provide._

_ And just in time as I threw myself backwards and away from the seemingly random lightning bolt, which impacted with a tree some forty meters away and detonated it loudly enough to be heard over the din of the dead and dying. My rapid gaze had just long enough to recognize a mask and a cloak when a pulsating, spiralling ball of angry red flames was hurtling through the clearing towards me._

_ But when it came to the manipulation of the elements, no one can match me and mine. I sheathed my blade in its leather casing in a single heartbeat. A flurry of movement later and a hurricane-class gust of wind kicked up, a Technique I picked up from my beloved, feeding the roaring fire and multiplying its radius. Had that been all it did, I would have just breathed my last. But my wind was more powerful than that. The fireball's insane momentum was diminished ever more each passing heartbeat, until it was reversed._

_ A veritable sea of flames was returned to the caster, many times squared the size of the original wave, and not even the Yellow Flash's insane speed should have been enough to escape the sheer mass of the flaming attack. But the Body Replacement Technique is instantaneous, so long as the chakra hook is prepared ahead of time. The scorched rock in-between me and my volleyed Technique disappeared, its space occupied by the crispy but still alive masked Rock shinobi._

_ He drew a long ninjato, longer, even, than the standard katana, and bolted forwards at speeds comparable to the earlier thrown lightning bolt. I knew, then, that this man was easily out of my class. But unpredictability and deception can see a rookie trump even the most ridiculously powerful of seasoned warriors. I created a Shadow Clone a solid seven metres away, Transformed to appear as if it were a random log, and attached a chakra hook to it, prepared and readied for a Body Replacement at any time._

_ I drew my blade, then. And we clashed. Sword met sword in a maelstrom of sparks and flashed movement. We both maintained the duration variation of the classic Body Flicker Technique, the Storming Flicker Technique. While heavily chakra draining, the almost uncontrollable speeds of the semi-permanent version of the Body Flicker ratcheted up the already life-threatening danger of this bloody fight._

_ I was losing. We both knew it. I was good, one of the best for my age, but this man had both experience and years on me. I was no prodigy and simply couldn't keep up. Within thirty seconds, forty five max, his pure speed and technique would outpace mine and his strike would cleave my skull clean of my shoulders._

_ So I made a mistake._

_ It was purposeful, not that he had realized it. But like any good swordsman he had capitalized on it without any conscious thought. What he hadn't realized was that I had been leading us across the clearing until his back was to my Transformed Shadow Clone. When the Transformation broke I had cast the already-prepared Body Replacement, and as I and the Clone were identical, he hadn't the slightest clue. And as his blade sunk into my heart... I popped into a plume of white smoke._

_ A moment later, he was decapitated by a clean stroke from behind._

* * *

I awoke in a daze and, for the first time since the Second Blood War began, didn't immediately snap to awareness. Rather, it was a gradual process. First, sounds, then smells and touch, shrouding me in a cocoon of warmth and relaxation and a primal sense of safety I haven't felt in years. It was a... novel experience. And so it was with a mournful longing that higher conscious thought returned to me, followed a split-second later by memory, and I tumbled out of the feather mattress with a squeak I would later fervently deny ever making.

_What the fuck was that?_

I wasn't a stranger to nightmares, especially from the war. But never have I held a sword, and never have I used any of this faux-ninja magic bullshit either. And this was clearly no ordinary night terror- it was a memory, and a damn clear one. For a moment I almost let myself believe it was from one of my Legilimized targets, but that didn't check out under further analysis.

Shaking my head, I shoved the errant thoughts to the back of my mind to be puzzled out later. After fighting my way to freedom out of the entrapment of stitched fabric, my first course of action – as always – was analyzing my surroundings. It was a useful if trying habit I had picked up during the War after going to sleep in an Albanian forest and awakening in a Snatcher's lair. As it was, I was mildly disturbed I let myself be so easily distracted by a curious memory and a warm bed.

The room I was in reminded me of Dudley's second bedroom, if only at first glance. The dimensions were about right, just large enough to comfortably fit the mattress and mahogany desk in opposite corners, and just small enough to comfort a woman like me that found sleeping in the closet underneath the stairs to be soothing after a year in the spacious Hogwarts' dorms. Spare rubber kunai and a shuriken littered the floor where my still slightly delirious mind had imagined broken toys to lay. The walls were painted a Gryffindor red, seeming obnoxious to my Ravenclaw sensibilities, but calming all the same after living in Shisui's retrofitted Grimmauld Place. There were likewise no paintings, wall-hangings, or windows, giving the apartment a spartan feel. The only illumination came from beneath the cherry-wood door.

I had an idea as to my location, but having no training in the Sensory Arts outside of my natural Uzumaki heritage, there was little way to double-check besides leaving. I rose to my feet only to fall back onto the mattress and take a closer look around. There was no closet or hidden nook or cranny to hide clothing in. Glancing down, I figured my skin and sleepwear would have to do, and idly hoped there would be no children around to traumatize: not that I cared, really. I had done worse to children. Why, just four weeks ago I had possessed a five-year-old, flipped through his memories like a muggle at the cinema, _ate_ his _soul,_ and am now walking around with his albeit shapeshifted body like its always been mine. Never let it be said Rose Potter-Black was a saint.

Back on topic. Whoever had dressed me surely got an eyeful, no matter how they went about it. Even in my sleep my vanity showed through, and I appeared more like a nymph or spirit from myth than a human female. The bra and panties were new and a casual black, somehow making me think a woman had been behind the change, but they were no less taunting because of it. Over the underclothes I wore naught but a sheer nightgown just long enough to brush against my thighs. The material was, to my joyous surprise, silk, and a matching black with silver trim.

Yet, all the black reminded me of the Second Blood War. The waist-length, raven hair only added to this. And while Transfiguration is a skill I want to keep on the down-low for now, my Metamorphic talent is something I absolutely refuse to go without. A moment later, the kinky strands were as white as freshly fallen snow. The vulpine... _additions,_ which I couldn't Metamorph away due to the tenketsu at each of their tips, were likewise changed to a soft white with raven tufts. My Killing Curse feline irises were transformed to an amber like compressed supernovas.

After spending what Tracey would call "a stupidly long time" musing over my appearance, I was finally done. Having no sense of modesty to at least see reason to wrap a blanket around my half-naked body, I casually opened the sole door to my temporary bedroom and walked outside. But attached to the opposite side of the frame was a white fox mask and a note, catching my attention before I stepped further into the hallway. Focusing for a moment on the several hundred years of collective experience on the language stored away in my mind to read the sloppy katakana, I read:

_"Fox-chan,_

_ "Welcome to the ANBU! Your new totally amazing and sexy brothers are waiting in the living room through the third door on the left. We'll be here all day, so no rush, 'kay? But we have dango and access to the Uchiha clan's collection of sake, so I wouldn't take too long. The Uchiha are avid partiers, so their sake is really good! And you must be hungry after being interrogated and brutally tortured all last week._

_ "You can find a spare change of clothes underneath the bed. Make sure to wear your new mask, too, Fox-chan! It will protect your identity from perverts and vagrants like us, awesome as we are. Even though we already know who you are. And even though your Bloodlimit means you have, like, a thousand faces. Just wear it, it makes the top brass happy. And when our bosses are happy, we get paid more, which means more dango and sake. Easy enough, right?_

_ "Your sexy new Taicho,_

_ "Dog._

_ "Post-Script: No need to illusion your foxy-ness. We love you just the way you are."_

My brain crashed. For several long moments, I just stood there. All higher conscious thought uselessly whirred like a spinning wheel on a muggle car that crashed into a ditch. An apt metaphor, actually.

Eventually, as my brain rebooted itself, I decided to read through again slower, and analyze each section piecemeal. It seems the third of the three potential ways Shisui and I expected the Hokage to respond turned out accurate. Which I was glad for, as Metamorphing to a six-year-old and joining the Academy sounded extraordinarily lame, and ANBU will offer a faster rate of experience than some private tutor.

I hoped I would be on a team with Shisui, although I doubted it. The two of us are not connected in any way in the eyes of the administration. And while I don't doubt an Uchiha will be on my team for the Sharingan, in case I fall into a berserker rage and threaten the release of the Nine Tails, there are far more Uchiha in ANBU than just my godfather. Especially since he is one of their best and probably wouldn't be wasted on a team with a greenhorn like me.

I ignored the entire section on food, sake, and latent Uchiha fervor. It just seemed... wrong. Shisui I could understand, but the rest of his clan reminded me of dark-haired Malfoys with a better talent at hiding their malice. I tried not to think about it.

The mention of my session at Torture & Interrogation once again ground my mind to a halt, though. Looking back, my stay there was my most recent memory bar the crazy war dream, yet it didn't once cross my mind since awakening. And when I focused on it, the entire ordeal seemed... fuzzy. Being carried by _Itachi-senpai_ was clear, unfortunately, but as I was led deeper and deeper towards Interrogation & Extraction Room 401, the memory lost its edge. By the time that crazy, if admittedly attractive violet-haired woman showed, all I could see was a hazy blur.

_"Well aren't we just the most adorable thing? My name is Mitarashi Anko. I'm sure we'll have **fun** together."_

I shivered, flashes of knives and vials and _soul-rending agony_ piercing my mind. This Inoichi-san must've been good if my automatic Occlumency wasn't able to recover the memories, but I found myself thankful instead of irked. This... person is _terrifying._ I faced the Dark Lord and gave him a smile, but just the thought of Mitarashi Anko has me wanting to dive back beneath the blankets of my bed.

Of course, Inoichi-san wouldn't be able to invade my mind had I wanted him out. But the original purpose of Occlumency is to, well, _occlude, _which means "to hide, or obscure." I had to allow him into my mind because any control over its defenses would've been ridiculously suspicious. All he saw, though, was the original memories of Uzumaki Naruto, cutting out the morning I possessed him. Hence, the amnesia of the month in-between, where the five-year-old hyper boy seemingly transformed into a shapeshifting female with a razor mind.

All knowledge of magic and what I can do with it, minus the Metamorphic talent, was likewise obscured. And while cutting back on the Cloak, Apparition, and my lovely Transfiguration spells in this line of work will be irksome, it was also necessary. If I'm ever in a bind, I could always Obliviate my comrades after, even if it leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Or I could lie – well, it's technically true, in this world – and say it's Yin Release, and I've been practicing it in my spare time.

Who knows? With a Sharingan, even shinobi might be able to cast 'magic.' Wouldn't _that_ infuriate the purebloods?

But none of that matters in light of this new complication spitting in the face of my scheme. Memories cannot actually be 'deleted' - even the horrendously illegal if highly useful Obliviation Charm only obscures memories. The mind is like a fishing net, and snipping out even one small section of it can, following the metaphor, release all of the fish trapped within. In other words, the target of a deleted memory might find any connecting memory - even implicit memories, like _how to fucking breathe - _gone as well.

Instead, I have in the past 'smoothed out' a memory, taking off the edge and rewiring the associative memories. I would then fold it in on itself, rolling it into a tight ball, and cover it in a thick haze of self-replicating magic, perhaps even hiding it elsewhere in my mind. It is like an exaggeration, an over-amplification of the forgetting process.

Such a technique is the only way to ensure the target doesn't suffer from chronic and viral amnesia because whatever incriminating evidence they managed to witness was connected mentally to something important, and the Obliviator went overboard. People don't just randomly suffer from bouts of seemingly inane amnesia. _It doesn't happen,_ and is thus rightly suspicious.

But I am an Occlumens, and a damn good one. While not as skilled at the defensive Mind Art as I am at the offensive, I have enough skill and raw talent in the discipline to reverse an Obliviation by the - at the time - third greatest Legilimancer alive in little over an hour. Considering this was _years_ ago and I have only gotten better, that I cannot even _find_ the memories obscured by someone lacking even a magical core is nothing short of terrifying.

A clan of Mind-Walkers of such skill shacking up in my new village is a liability I am not willing to risk. I will have to do something about this glaring oversight. Even if it means killing them all.

I breathe deeply, calming myself and clearing my mind. No use panicking about it. All will come in time.

_"You can find a spare change of clothes underneath the bed. Make sure to wear your new mask, too, Fox-chan! It will protect your identity from perverts and vagrants like us, awesome as we are. Even though we already know who you are. And even though your Bloodlimit means you have, like, a thousand faces. Just wear it, it makes the top brass happy. And when our bosses are happy, we get paid more, which means more dango and sake. Easy enough, right?"_

Frowning, because I already checked underneath the bed, a whisper of an idea echoed in my mind. I couldn't help but sigh. The hunch was all but assured by the third line where my new Taicho happily calls himself a pervert. He must've "forgotten" to leave a change of clothes. Add in the simple fact I'm dressed in something the wizards would call lingerie, and it was clear. I'll have to introduce myself to my new ANBU team half-naked, and sounds like they're all men, too. Isn't _that_ a good first impression?

Good thing I just don't give a fuck. I never cared if someone looked, so long as they don't touch. That men would look at all made me feel joy in my appearance, actually, even though I can change it on a whim. Incredibly low bodily self esteem is just another emotional scar from the Dursleys. A curious trait for a Metamorph, I'll be the first to admit, but one easily relieved if not so easily fixed. So I didn't mind indulging my new team in this.

Who knows? Perhaps - one day - they could help me get over this vanity flaw. Because it _is_ a flaw. My complete and utter disregard for logic in my appearance has gotten me into a few sticky situations over the Blood War. It is rather difficult to maintain a cover when you refuse to look like anything less than a goddess. I seem to remember Bellatrix Black killing all of the excessively beautiful civilians she chanced across on principal alone, just in case it happened to be me under a new guise. I'm ashamed to say it almost worked, too, and even worse is I still couldn't fix the problem even with my life on the line.

It was distressing to realize I cared more about my beauty than my life. Not that I minded getting dirty, but only because even soaked in blood, sweat, and earth, my usual forms could still qualify me for a magazine cover and the throne of some third world country. Ridiculous.

Forcibly derailing my unhelpful train of thought, I couldn't help but laugh after reading the rest of the paragraph. I and... Dog-Taicho... were surely going to get along well toge-

_Dog-Taicho?!_

Shisui had told me about the ANBU legend. While he gave me no name, it was child's play to connect him to the infamous Sharingan no Kakashi, the Copy Ninja. The ANBU Captain with the least recorded comrade's deaths for such a high mission success rate. The prodigy who was apprenticed to the Yondaime fucking Hokage, Namikaze Minato the Yellow Flash. And the Hokage gave me to _him?_

… And he's a dirty _pervert?_

I shook my head fondly. It reminded me of all the soldiers under my command during the Second Blood War who were surprised to find out that I, the Girl-Who-Lived, the Butcher of London, and the only witch who Voldemort ever feared, was a nymphomaniac. Their expressions were always priceless during those all-too-often times when I would be in whatever mess hall we scrapped together wearing sometimes even less than this. Classic.

Attaching the fox mask to my face with a burst of chakra – because I wasn't doing nothing these past four weeks – I turned and strode casually down the hallway. Had I been anyone else, I'd be terrified out of my mind walking into a room of male ANBU in clothing so teasing. As it was, I found myself mildly amused by it all. Shisui had told me all ANBU were eccentric, and hearing that coming from a wizard of all people gave me hope that maybe this new world wouldn't be so different after all. Wizards were the same way.

The hallway was a dark grey with crimson accents, and I realized why it seemed so familiar. I had seen it when I was using my Cloak to break into the Uchiha compound four weeks back. And the room I was just using had the same obnoxious color walls as Shisui's room, which means it was probably his childhood bedroom. I couldn't help but snicker at the thought that the man who would one day house my godfather's soul had the same ridiculous taste in color. A Gryffindor for sure.

I didn't bother knocking on the door, knowing my chakra was like a beacon. Had it not been for the basic knowledge on the Sensory Arts of one of my Legilimency targets all those weeks ago, I would have been found on my first day after being "abducted." As it was, I developed a way to enshroud my chakra with magic, nullifying my presence. I would've been a chakra void, which is even more suspicious, had it not been for the leaks in the barrier, making me feel more like a civilian to Sensors. Of course, I didn't bother with such right now, as that would be suspicious and impossible to explain.

Stepping through the doorway, I spied my three new ANBU "brothers."

The first one to catch my eye wore a Mouse mask. His hair was a scruffy brown, the shade of freshly tilled mud, a particular shade I had never seen before. His eyes were the same exact color which, while curious, wasn't exactly unusual in the Elemental Nations where blue and green hair was common and golden irises could be seen outside of werewolves. He wore the standard ANBU flak jacket and bandaged pants. If I were to guess, I'd place him in the early twenties.

The second ANBU was much, much younger. He looked barely twelve years old and, unlike his companion, his gaze snapped to me the instant the door creaked. I thought I could see a flash of red through his Weasel mask's eye holes before it returned to black, but knowing this was Shisui's _prodigous Itachi-senpai, _I somehow doubted the apparently asexual shinobi genius wanted to memorize my half-naked form. No, such a thing would be such a _frivolous_ use of the _famed _and _revered _Sharingan.

Kami, I wanted to _Avada Kedavra_ the guy so bad. Seven fucking times throughout the past four weeks Shisui had been called away from _me, _his long-lost goddaughter, because of this... this child! I've killed people for less. If such an action wouldn't hurt Shisui emotionally, _Itachi-senpai's_ life would be _forfeit. _I'd dance on his grave and sing Hallelujah.

Stifling my righteous anger, my gaze flickered to the third of the ANBU, and found myself unsurprised. This was clearly Dog-Taicho. Also, this was clearly the man who happily called himself a pervert in his introductory letter, because his headband was torn free from over his eye, his Sharingan blazing and happily memorizing my latest body.

The benefit of the doubt was further quashed when I saw my spare change of clothes on the hand-table next to him.

"Oh, Fox-chan! You're up already!" His voice sounded ridiculously happy, and I felt the strangest desire to clock the guy in the face. "Here, I must've forgotten to leave you your new uniform!" _Forgot, my ass._

But all that was ignored as I spied his insane, gravity-defying silver hair, and a wave of Uzumaki Naruto's memories flooded my mind. "Dog-niisan?"

As the Nine Tails Jinchuuriki, I had an ANBU guard at all times. Well, not _me,_ but Naruto; yet the memories were mine now and his soul had been subsumed, so that's mere semantics. While most of my Legilimizing has me stealing memories and knowledge and leaving sentiment and attachment behind, the situation with Naruto is different. This is a true mix. I am the combination of five years Jinchuuriki and twenty five years Wizarding savior. But Naruto only has three years of conscious memory, while Rose has well over twenty, making me far more Rose Potter-Black, war hero and witch, then sad orphan Uzumaki Naruto. But that doesn't stop the sentiment from being there.

It was a situation rather similar to Shisui's, actually, despite lying to him about overpowering Naruto's soul. The Uchiha clan hated me- _Naruto_ more than anyone else did, and for good reason. And since Shisui is, well, more Shisui than he is Sirius, I didn't want that corrupting his view of me. Even if I had all of Naruto's fragile emotional state and sentiment towards the Fire Shadow and two of his most trusted ANBU.

Because while most of my guardsmen just made sure I wasn't in any life-threatening situations, and stopped the more extreme abuse taking place outside of the orphanage, those two actively ensured I was happy. The first was Cat-neechan, and the second was Dog-niisan. They were the only people I considered family. Wish Shisui added in, I now had more family in this distant dimension only reached through the Veil of Death than I ever have in Britain. A depressing thought.

And I didn't connect my elder brother with the legendary ANBU Captain Shisui told me about. My godfather made him out to be a badass motherfucker, while Naruto's inherited memories painted him as a perverted, lazy, but trustworthy elder brother figure who would hold me as I cried myself to sleep, and taught me the Transformation Technique so I could walk the streets of the Leaf without fear. The thought I was assigned to his team made me... strangely happy. Like a slightly muted version of my first realization, on the other side of the Veil, that I would be seeing my godfather again. Naruto's mind must have affected me even more than I thought, which would have been mildly alarming if I could convince myself to care.

Still, Dog-niisan was someone I knew I could trust. Even if he was openly leering at me.

"Dog-niisan... Taicho? Dog-Taicho, you're weird." My voice was casual, almost deadpan, as if I didn't care – which I didn't. I crossed the distance between us but didn't snatch the ANBU uniform my perverted Captain left on the table. My latent Marauder's humor, compounded by Naruto's base mischievious nature, gave me a much better idea.

And so I settled down sideways on his lap, nuzzling the right side of his neck and cooing absently. It was an action I had taken several times back when I was only Naruto. I had no qualms using my Metamorph status as a pranking tool. And he is the one who started this pranking contest and caused me to walk into this ANBU meeting half-naked _anyways._ So he can't call me out on unprofessional behavior without sounding like a hypocrite.

Turnabout is fair play.

"Well, ah..." he coughed, suddenly realizing his 'little brother' and I, a seventeen-year-old shapeshifter with no qualms of cheating my way to unearthly beauty, were one and the same. He no doubt wishes he hadn't memorized my body, then, because now it's just weird. He replaced his Leaf hitai-ate over the Sharingan eye hurriedly. "Moving on. You're on my team now, Fox-chan. Any questions?"

"No, Taicho," I murmured sleepily. I curled my tail ontop of my lap, threading the fingers of my right hand through it lazily.

"This is Mouse," he nodded his head towards the only respectable ANBU there. "He's specialized with tracking, trapping, the Sensory Arts, and stealth. He has the Wood Release, and don't ask how, because I'll just laugh and ruffle your hair." He ruffled my hair anyways, seeming to find my ears even more adorable now that they're located on a female, which is a thought I found mildly disturbing when applied to my elder brother figure. "He's kind of boring, so that's really all you need to know about him. You can just pretend he's not there, like I do."

Mouse gave a sort of strangled dismissive noise. He probably has a sense of hero worship for Taicho, and being dismissed so easily by him must be horrifying. And hilarious. That too.

"And this is Weasel-kun," he continued blithely. "He's specialized with everything, like us awesome child prodigies usually are. Mostly the Illusory and Ninja Arts, though. He's got a three-tomoe Sharingan too. And he likes sweets, I think. Maybe. That's really his entire existence, right there." Dog shrugged. "He's also rather boring. And while I'm trying to corrupt him to the amazing Icha Icha series, I'm not making any headway. So you can just ignore him too."

I nodded my head seriously, but had to ask. "Icha Icha, Taicho?"

"It's the most wondrous thing!" He unSealed a thin orange-covered book from what I assumed to be a tattoo on his forearm. I blinked in surprise. "It's written by the great Toad Sage, Jiraiya of the Sannin! A tale of love, hardship, and a single man's desperate struggle against the world, and all the women in it!"

"Ah," I made a vaguely accepting noise in the back of my throat. "It's porn, isn't it?"

Dog sniffed. "You don't have to be so cold, Fox-chan. Just trying to share fine literature with my adorable little sister."

"I didn't say no," I muttered, stopping him from reSealing it into his tattoo. I plucked it from his surprised fingers and set it down on my lap, curling my tail ontop of it. I'd read it later.

There was a moment of shocked silence in the room. "Yes!" Dog-Taicho suddenly cheered, breaking it. "I have the best little sister ever! And the best ANBU teammate. You're my new favorite. Sorry, Weasel-kun."

Mouse made another choking sound, realizing that made him Taicho's least favorite. Weasel didn't seem to care, but he's an Uchiha, and probably wouldn't outwardly react if the entire Village Hidden in the Leaves burned down with him still trapped within it.

"And that leaves me. I'm Dog-niisan, the greatest Black Ops agent to ever grace the Leaf, and avid reader of Icha Icha! I also have a Sharingan, and I'm far better with it than Weasel-kun is. My likes are copying new Techniques from enemies of the Village and laughing in their faces, and long walks on moonlit nights. I dislike the Bloody Mist and people who think I shouldn't read Icha Icha in public. My hobbies are things that shouldn't be mentioned in polite company, or anywhere, really. For an example you should check out page two-one-two of Icha Icha Recluse, which is the paperback I just gave you a moment ago. My dreams are to copy one thousand Techniques, so whenever someone whispers that supposed accomplishment of mine they aren't dirty liars, and to get my entire collection of Icha Icha signed by the great Toad Sage!"

I blinked at him, trying and failing to absorb that deluge of information. Giving up, I stored the entire memory in the back of my mind somewhere and silently promised to deal with it later. The only part I caught was, "page two-one-two?"

While I opened my welcome-to-the-Black-Ops gift of porn, my Taicho just laughed. I was happy to realize the ANBU weren't as stuffy as the Aurors back home. But being largely self-regulated, I could see why. There was no real bereaucracy to get in the way, and since all powerful shinobi are insane, the system is likewise crazy. So long as we completed our missions in a reasonable time frame, no one gave a fuck. "So. Introduce yourself, Fox-chan."

"Hi, I'm Fox," I began blithely, multitasking between my bland introduction and reading page two-one-two. "I like chocolate but hate sweets. My hobbies are making the lives of everyone around me a living Hell. My dream is to make it to my eighteenth birthday without disappearing for another month and coming back looking like I just lost a fight with a paper shredder, with a further advanced mind and another genetically engineered Bloodlimit that no one has ever heard of before. That'd be ni- holy kami, can you even bend like that?" I blinked at the page before shrugging idly, my voice still casual. "Said artificial Bloodlimit lets me shapeshift, granted I am aware of the anatomy and biology involved and don't fuck with the tenketsu. I call it Metamorph. I have no formal training and so I suck at everything. I also have a chakra demon in my gut, which is the reason for the less-than-human appearance. I can't Metamorph them away because they have tenketsu at their tips."

"Very good, Fox-chan!" My Taicho's irritatingly happy voice cut in again. The desire to clock him came once more but I suppressed it with growing ease. I'd rather not be written up for violent insubordination and assaulting a superior officer ten minutes into the Black Ops. "Now it is time for training. It's six o'clock in the morning, and we'll be working you to the bone until eight o'clock tonight. Then we'll have patrol until two o'clock in the morning. Then we'll wake you up at six o'clock, and do it all over again!" He eye-smiled at me, but I can imagine easily enough the predatory grin behind his ever-present mask.

Before I could question the ridiculous pace, he vanished in a Body Flicker, taking me with him.

_Fuck._


	4. Fear The Mind's Puppeteer

_**Disclaimer:**_ Even if I were to claim I own the Potterverse or Narutoverse, no one would believe me. So. Yeah, I _totally_ own these 'verses. Kneel, motherfucker.

* * *

**Whispers In The Dark**

**~ And Other Morally Reprehensible Things ~**

**by Rozen Krone**

**Dog's Pack: Fear The Mind's Puppeteer**

Like the gargoyles that surrounded seemingly every pureblood's mansion, I crouched upon the rooftop of the Konoha General Hospital in silent vigil. Between the Disillusionment, Muffling, and Scent-Blocking Charms, I was more or less hidden from all forms of natural sensory; and with my chakra veiling technique, which I have taken to calling the Enshrouding Charm, I was hidden from supernatural sensory. It wasn't perfect, and the few flaws in the technique would no-doubt land me in a sticky situation one of these days, but for this operation, it was more than enough.

As I waited for the sun to fall beneath the horizon, I could only wonder what my comrades would think of me if they could see me now. I was, after all, about to commit breaking and entering into a house of healing so I could crack open an old man's mind and steal all his secrets. There is no greater violation of privacy. And I'd do worse, before all was done. In my hunt to slay Lord Voldemort, I've become what I once hated most: Dark. And I found that I just didn't care anymore. How... poetic.

It's not like I cared about killing Voldemort anymore. It gave me purpose, direction, a meaning to my life, sure. But I've already driven him away from Britain, if at the cost of everyone I had wanted to protect in the first place. And I saw no need for vengeance. I'm going to kill him, merely because killing him is all I know. All there ever was to me.

The sun passed beneath the trees, casting a great shadow over the land. I snickered, knowing my magic would nullify the sound. It wasn't like me to cry over spilt coffee. I had bled my tendency to mope and murmur out of myself during the War. There had been no use for guilt or regrets back then.

I stalked over to the far corner of the Hospital rooftop, steps silent even without aid from my magic. I suppose I shouldn't feel surprised. Taicho was trained by the White Fang and the Yellow Flash, and he's combined the worst of both their training regimes and doubled their session length, knowing my Jinchuuriki-enhanced stamina could handle it. It's some perverse form of protective instinct. He knows we'll be moved off patrol roster in six months and he doesn't want me to make a rookie mistake on a mission and get myself killed. I suppose it's better than lazing around, but I still want to hex him every time he wakes me up after a mere three and a half hours' rest.

As I reach the edge, I pace backwards precisely seventeen steps, and sideways another nine. Judging that this is about as accurate as my reconnaissance will get me, I nod to myself in satisfaction and activate the Cloak.

Death's Cloak of Intangibility is a... curious artifact. The first several dozen times I had activated it, I sunk straight through the earth. I had to Apparate to the surface and nullify my magic or risk incineration from the heat deep beneath the Earth should the Cloak bleed my reserves dry. A very real fear, considering its power requirement. In the end, I reverse engineered one of the weaker Barrier Charms in my arsenal, and developed a version that coalesced the corporeal magic underneath me instead of all around me. It was exceedingly difficult modifying the barrier to make contact with me at all, considering the entire purpose of the spell was to somehow counteract my intangibility, but in the end I managed it by simply tying it into the Cloak's effects in the same way my clothing was.

This spell, which I spent seven months developing, is not cast. Instead, I sink through the rooftop, and three more floors beneath it. I only erect the modified Barrier Charm when I find myself face to face with one Yamanaka Inoshasa, of Konoha General Hospital's Long Term Effects Ward.

Cutting the flow of power to the Cloak which had been melded with my soul years ago, I recast the four Anti-Sensory Charms. I make sure to stay out of the hidden camera's field of view for the split second I was visible after the disruption of the Cloak's magic. I then magically manifest an Illusion of the room as it was moments prior in front of the ocular lens.

When I had realized the Illusory Arts were one of the three great shinobi arts, I immediately looked into the field and compared and contrasted it with magic's variation. I found the two to be incredibly different, both in strengths and weaknesses. The shinobi version feeds energy into the enemy's mind, turning their own chakra system against them, but can be disrupted by a chakra burst. The wizarding version however bends light and manifests a true Illusion, not changing the target's reaction to stimuli but rather the stimuli itself.

While Genjutsu cannot be used to block a camera lens like I have moments earlier, it is also far more efficient resource-wise. Even with my considerable spiritual energy reserves, I can only maintain the magical Illusion for a short while. Between that, my usage of the Cloak, the four Anti-Sensory Charms, and what I'm about to do next? Taicho is going to be less than impressed when I show up for our fourteen hour training session in thirty minutes down half of my spiritual energy reserves. But no use bemoaning my imminent torture session. Magic's a-wasting.

I stride casually over to the comatose Yamanaka, flip open his eyelids, mutter the incantation, and slip into his mind. The moment the vast Tapestry manifests before me, I recall my least favorite teacher's explanation on the offensive Mind Art:

_"The mind is not a book, to be opened at will and examined at leisure. Thoughts are not etched on the inside of skulls, to be perused by any invader. The mind is a complex and many-layered thing... It is true, however, that those who have mastered Legilimency are able, under certain conditions, to delve into the minds of their victims and to interpret their findings correctly."_

And if there is one talent of mine I am most proud of, it is my mastery over Legilimency. The mind takes a different representation for each practitioner of the Art, and so each hopeful must pave their own road. Severus once told me that, for him, the mind of his target manifests as a great castle of glass; how he delves through it, and how he interprets it as knowledge, I haven't the slightest clue.

But I see life differently. I find character to be a primordial balance between nature and nurture, a realization I came to watching Dudley become exactly like his father. I also find life to be like a rainbow of colors, such as when I saw the almost Gryffindor Tracey Davis become more and more Slytherin the longer she wore their green and silver. I find beauty in death, grace in combat, and art in broken battlefields.

And so I interpret the mind of others like a cinematic reel, what I have come to call the Tapestry. But whereas my eyes are bound by the limitations of the world, and can only see a specific section of the color spectrum due to their grounding in reality, my mind has no such law. The Tapestry has thousands upon thousands of colors, each color a single thread, and only a small handful depict my targets' experiences; just like only a small section of the mind contains memory. Other threads measure primal instinct, emotion, knowledge, intuition, desires, higher conscious thought, movement of the physical body, perception, personality, and recognition of external stimuli. And like a masterful puppeteer, the mind is my marionette.

It is as beautiful as it is deadly. The first time I removed myself from a full dive, I found the waking world to be indescribably dull compared to the sheer vividness of the mind.

Within moments of analyzing the Yamanaka's final waking memories I realize the civilian nurse I had Legilimized yesterday morning had accurate information. This fool, halfway through developing a new Mind-Walking Technique, managed to sever his own consciousness. Dumbass. He'll be sitting pretty until one of his clansmen takes pity on him and reverse engineers the Technique he's been working on. And considering most of his clan works for the Torture & Interrogation Division, I can imagine them being sadistic assholes about it and making him suffer for a few months. I'd do the same thing, had I been this moron's cousin. Too bad now's not the time to be mocking the idiot Yamanaka.

I cast my focus to both the beginning and the end of the Tapestry, and ignore all else save for the threads depicting knowledge. I sever these threads at both ends, but instead of becoming undone, the vaguely blue metaphysical depictions of thousands upon thousands of facts duplicate themselves. I bind the copy and store it in my own mind, but cast a cursory glance back over his Tapestry before leaving.

I'm glad I did, because I notice most of his threads in the Tapestry growing steadily longer, and realize he's still awake. Not fully conscious, perhaps, but semi-aware all the same. And while I could carefully edit out my own presence, as I possess the finesse and skill required, it would take at the least thirty more minutes stuck in this idiot's mind. Thirty minutes I don't have, with my Anti-Sensory Charms and Illusion draining away at my spiritual energy. And even that might not be enough, as I have yet to peruse my stolen knowledge on the Yamanaka Kinjutsu.

Inoichi fooling even my mastery over Occlumency flashed through my mind. No, I cannot take the risk. I refuse to be found.

As I pull out of the unlucky Yamanaka's mind, I come to a decision. I slink over to the rolling medical device keeping him alive, the complicated invention pumping oxygen into his blood. Slipping a kunai from my holster, I slit a certain cord. In a single heartbeat, oxygen stops pulsing into the man's circulatory network, and instead uselessly oxygenated the medical bay air. A second slice later, and the cord relaying his heartbeat to the machine's monitor blinks out, failing to whir the alarm.

No one can know I was here. Granted, were he to one day wake up, he'd just assume another Yamanaka had been in his mind. Thing is, my chakra signature is now laced all over his brain; even when it fades in ten to fifteen minutes, he'll still have it memorized from the sheer virtue of close contact with his own chakra. There is always the chance that he might recognize me from Sensory alone. I cannot take that chance. The Potter luck would see him curious over how a non-Yamanaka could enter his mind, and from there, I'd find myself back in the Interrogation & Extraction chambers.

He worked for T&I. If the Uchiha Police Force magically grows more clever overnight and determines his cause of death as sabotage, they'll have thousands of potential suspects who might have a bone to pick with him. Considering how easy it was to slice a few cords, and how shinobi can create clones or civilians can hire mercenaries for twenty Ryo a pop, their odds of narrowing down the list of suspects any reasonable number are dismal. And nowhere will I be on that list _anyways_. What would I, rookie ANBU and self-proclaimed future Hokage want with the death of some random Yamanaka?

I once more activate the Cloak and cast the modified Barrier Charm, making my way out of the Hospital. I can't help but wonder over how easy it had been to murder someone. How the Rose Potter of ten years ago would rather commit suicide than do such a thing. I stifle a rueful laugh at the thought.

When had I ever been innocent?

Ghosting through the walls of the Village's prime General Hospital, I slip into the nearest alleyway and Disapparate. The Muffling Charm is attached to me, and since the trademark _crack _snaps the air _after_ my disappearance, it's not a spell I wish to use in an occupied area unless I want to erect a static Soundless Field Charm. And as I won't be around to take the spell back down after I Disapparate, I'd rather some nurse not realize the laws of physics were broken in the room a renowned Torture & Interrogation clansmen had died under mysterious circumstances.

Reappearing in my ANBU-assigned dorm room deep beneath the Village Hidden in the Leaf, I attach my standard issue fox mask and cut the flow of magic to my four Anti-Sensory Charms. Nodding in satisfaction, I split my focus in half and begin the long trek to Training Field Forty Two. Meanwhile, the other half of my attention is centered inwards. I breathe deeply, and with the mental imaging of a crack of lightning obliterating the moon, call forth my Occlumency.

I have forty-odd years of knowledge curled up into a tight ball and locked in the back of my mind from my... less-than-kind treatment of Yamanaka Inoshasa. If I just leave it back there to rot, it'll drag down my thought processes like too many gigabytes on an old computer. Plus, there's a reason I chose to Legilimize a Yamanaka T&I member. Their clan Kinjutsu has been driving me insane with worry. Not even the Dark Lord has been able to fuck with my mind since that catastrophe Fifth Year. While I did allow Inoichi in, he wasn't supposed to actually manage to erase any memories.

I find the royal blue spool of stolen memories deep in the back, away from my own Tapestry. I prod it with the slightest burst of magic, and as it unravels, forty years of implicit memories assault my mind.

Think of an amnesiac patient. They can remember how to ride a bike, but they haven't the slightest clue who taught them, when, how, what their first bike looked like... They lack conscious awareness of how they acquired this ability, just that they have this ability. That's what an implicit memory is.

I remember clearly the time I had Legilimized Lucius Malfoy. Instead of unravelling his implicit memories, I had chosen the explicit by accident. I was never able to look Narcissa in the eye again, which coming from me is saying something. Not necessarily good, but something. It was unfortunate as she had defected to our side by then, and I had to meet up with her every other week for the next five years to talk resources. The moment she realized why I always stuttered or flushed in her presence? Most awkward conversation of my life.

But I now have forty years of extra implicit memories thrown into my mind. Granted, it's not the first time I've done such a thing, and won't be the last, either. Much of Occlumency is giving yourself subconscious commands that later become automatic, like breathing, or beating your heart. It's why I always become calm under pressure, rational in the face of overwhelming anger, and check my surroundings immediately upon awakening; I had quite literally programmed these tendencies into my very brain. Occlumency affects both the conscious and subconscious after all, and implicit memories are firmly in the realm of the latter.

For example, I already _know_ how to walk, so the implicit memory teaching me that isn't at all helpful. When I first developed this technique, I was becoming mentally slower and slower as my mind was bogged down by all of this redundant data. So when I commanded my mind to delete all but one 'copy' of implicit memories, and to automatically do so every time I absorb more of them, my magic responded.

Ergo, one hundred percent of the redundant knowledge I acquire is immediately obliterated by my magic. All that leaves is the _new_ knowledge, which unfortunately isn't completely helpful, as I now know the cup sizes of every Yamanaka female above the age of fourteen. Yamanaka Inoshasa, apparently, is a pervert. Surprise, surprise. Maybe _that's_ why no one bothered trying to release him from his self-induced comatose state. Killing him might've been a public service.

Moving on from that, I begin sorting through the more relevant data, because when I came to the Elemental Nations I had no idea there was an entire clan of Mind-Walkers in my chosen Village. And perverted he might be, but Inoshasa was no pushover. He was a veteran T&I Jounin, skilled enough to begin developing his own Techniques, even if he royally fucked it up. I had chosen him for a reason, after all.

I was just coming to the section on chakra theory about most Yamanaka Kinjutsu secretly being dual-target Genjutsu when I arrive at Training Field Forty Two with seconds to spare. Taicho smiles at me, an all-too-happy grin I can perceive even through the mask. The smile promises pain.

_How?_ I wonder. _He doesn't have his Sharingan out. How does he know I've depleted my Yin chakra? How!?_

"You must be so eager to train today if you started already, Fox-chan," he tells me. "Fifty laps."

I swallow, but don't dare to complain. Forty Two isn't the largest of the Training Fields, even if it is close. He's only asking me to run_ twenty five fucking miles_ as the warm-up's warm-up. Inwardly flinging Cruciatus Curses at my Taicho's dementedly grinning body, I pulse the bare minimum of chakra through my system and kick off into a heavy run.

Most of my schedule this last week since joining ANBU has been hardcore physical exertion. I need to build up muscle and physical energy, _quick. _Turns out my Metamorph talent isn't supposed to age me from five to seventeen without a few harmful side effects. Like death. Had I been anyone other than a Jinchuuriki, specifically of the Nine Tails, I would have killed myself through sheer ignorance.

Whoops.

I can't actually affect the volume, density, and strength of my chakra network, bone structure, or musculature. When I aged myself twelve years, my muscles grew in size to match my elder frame, sure; but they also weakened in strength inversely. Despite being larger, they were no more powerful. I was, essentially, running around those first four weeks with a five-year-old's muscle strength. Without the demonic chakra empowering my body, I wouldn't have been able to walk at all.

Bone structure was even worse. They were larger, yes, but less dense because of it. I was ridiculously fragile and didn't have the slightest clue. A fall down a particularly large set of stairs might have actually managed to kill me where the Dark Lord Voldemort failed for twenty-five years. How pathetic is that?

In the end, though, my chakra network is likely what would have done me in. I can enlarge and shrink my coils, but the chakra resists my magic, like matching magnets. It forces a constant magic drain rather than the one-off transformation cost I'm used to for Metamorphing my body. If I'm careful I can reduce the size of my ears and tail without touching the chakra network, but I can only shrink their size maybe twenty percent, and it makes me look oddly proportioned. But I wasn't doing that; I was clever enough not to fuck around with alien biology, especially when said foreign material is hooked up to a demon of incomprehensible power. What I was doing was somehow _worse._

My magic shrouds my coils, taking up the corner of my mind that regulates control over supernatural energies: which is apparently a thing. I was slowly draining myself dry of chakra simply by automatically infusing my body with the energy and strength needed to walk. I would have eventually faced chakra depletion – I _should_ have faced chakra depletion, had I not had that Tailed Beast in my gut – and never known until I keeled over, already a corpse.

The medical shinobi who diagnosed the problem hadn't the slightest clue why I was unable to access my chakra network, but ended up blaming 'the idiotic bastard who experimented on a five-year-old Jinchuuriki.' The mind apparently sends electrical signals into it like it would any other organ, which is how shinobi can 'control' it. But my magic already took that spot in my brain, an unfortunate side effect of my ruthless and ignorant Occlumency techniques my first hour in the Elemental Nations. Luckily, spiritual energy generated in the soul doesn't show up in their scans, because they use the energy manifested in the mind. After an eight hour long surgery, they were able to re-connect the brain tissue to the chakra network, so now I can 'feel' it.

And I was running on fumes. Two more days? No more Rose Potter-Black.

The Fire Shadow called in several dozen Jounin and had them donate their chakra, infusing it into my chakra coils. Now Taicho has me doing nothing but physical exercise until I no longer require constant chakra expenditure and nightly infusions from his own coils to stand upright. Even my ridiculous reserves aren't infinite, and if I never have the chance to actually regenerate chakra, it was only a matter of time until I ran out. I'd rather not win the award for most humiliating death one week into the Black Ops, thank you.

Unfortunately, that means more running. As an academic Ravenclaw, even one who cheated on just about every assignment and test during my six-year tenure, I find physical exertion to be awful. I exercised religiously back in Britain, yes, but only because reflex and agility could save my life in a fight. Had I lived in peace time, I would have gleefully used my Metamorph talent to stay more-or-less in shape while I lazed around with books and chocolate all day, every day. I would have gotten away with it too. With the fortunes of the Potters and Blacks, I would never have had to work a day in my life.

But this isn't that world. Because of my forced aging, I now have to work out like Oliver Wood before a Quidditch match with Slytherin just so I don't accidentally off myself in the middle of the night. Fuck.

I suppose I should feel thankful. If it weren't for the chakra monster in my gut, I would be too dead to complain. Said chakra monster is also amplifying my endurance to godly levels, giving me the resources needed to build up my physical energy the natural way. Despite all of the grief it caused me/Naruto in my/our youth, I found myself grateful to it, not that it had a choice in the matter. Now only if it could give me a... shortcut...

_Could it be that easy?_

My Inspection Charms, the trance magic that first broke the news of a faux magic circulatory system to me all those weeks ago beneath the orphanage, had also told me - on further study - that the chakra demon in my gut was formed entirely out of Yang chakra: otherwise known as physical energy. It was demonic, yes, but Yang chakra all the same. I don't know if Namikaze Minato took the Yin half to the Shinigami with him, or if that is simply how Tailed Beasts are, but I also don't care. Why would I work so hard to increase my Yang production by minute increments when I have a demon bound to my will that can do it for me? All I'd have to do would manipulate the Seal to pulse far more of its demonic energy into my body than the insignificant leak it is managing right now. Problem solved.

Thing is, I don't know the Sealing Arts. There are no real Fuuinjutsu Masters in the Leaf of sufficient skill for me to Legilimize, and have a snowball's chance in Hell of altering the Seal and not killing myself halfway. The only practitioner that would have enough skill would be Jiraiya the Toad Sage, but he's a Sannin and a little out of my league at the moment.

I'll have to ask Taicho, then. Give him the idea, see what he makes of it. We only have six months before we start going on missions, and if I have to spend the entire time doing nothing but laps and other basic physical exertion I'll never be ready. The only things I've learned are silent footsteps and Tree-Climbing or Wall-Walking or whatever they're calling it, and I had to cheat to learn even that.

I finish the fiftieth lap and drop into a set of push-ups without bothering to wait for Taicho's say-so. I then move on to crunches, mountain climbers, lunges, and half a million other things that the very thought of makes me want to swear up a storm. I can't wait until I learn some Clone Technique I can Transform to look like Taicho, just so I can Crucio it. I have plenty of pent-up rage, I suppose.

Although his 'welcome-to-the-Black-Ops' gift alleviated my anger somewhat. Jiraiya is a goddamn genius. Where has he been all my life? If I wasn't into women, I'd throw myself at him, him being my grandfather's age notwithstanding. Christ. I can see why Taicho carries the entire series around with him. I will too when I finally get the time to have a Sealing tattoo inked on me.

I was just moving on to pull-ups off a tree branch when I was interrupted and not at all in a good way.

"Fox-chan! Come say hello to Crow-chan! She'll be your partner from here on out, kinda like how Weasel-kun is stuck with Mouse," Taicho called. I snickered to myself, finding amusement in the way Mouse grew a tree out of the earth in front of him only to smash a chakra-infused fist through it in hybrid fury and dejection. I knew Taicho was actually rather fond of Mouse, but since Mouse was clearly raised in the ANBU, his social skills weren't exactly sharp. He obviously couldn't see the almost brotherly if distant affection in Taicho's voice that's all but obvious to me.

I wasn't going to point it out to him. His depression was far too funny.

As I dropped to the earth from a low-hanging branch, I decided that there was at least one silver lining to my near accidental suicide by Metamorph misuse. While I couldn't actually manipulate the size of my chakra coils for longer than a handful of moments, as the chakra flow would repulse the magic and force it back to normal – or, at least, Jinchuuriki dimension traveler normal – I could tighten the coils near the tenketsu at the soles of my feet for that needed second to skyrocket my chakra control by diminishing my chakra capacity in that extremity. Not the most glamorous use of the famed Black family talent, but I was able to pick up Wall-Walking, or Tree-Climbing as my comrade tree-huggers like to call it, in only two hours. And once I figured it out, I separated the implicit memory from the explicit and buried it deep in my subconscious, skipping the need for practice and making it instinct. It wouldn't help my chakra control or muscle memory, but my mind would be prepared, which is something, at least.

It's cheating, but I'm an official shinobi now, so cheating is kind of in the job description. I was never the most honorable sort in the first place. I didn't earn the moniker "the Butcher of London" by playing fair.

Then Taicho's words finally made it through my ears and into my brain, and I realized I now had to put up with another human being every day for the next several years.

In my defense, I was still hung up on Yamanaka Inoshasa's implicit memories, then laughing at Mouse's insecurities. I had no idea having a fifth member join our already overpowered patrol and training team was even in the cards, let alone being dealt. We already had a shapeshifting and mildly unbalanced Jinchuuriki, the last practitioner of the Wood Release, the Uchiha prodigy, and Sharingan no Kakashi, sole surviving student of both the White Fang and Yellow Flash. _And all we did was patrol._

I wasn't dense, either. I knew why this team was put together. Taicho held an emotional connection to me, reducing the chance of their sole demon container becoming a flight risk or even more mentally unshackled, and was well-versed with the Sharingan – which was ideal for taming a Tailed Beast. Weasel had the same eyes, for even more insurance, and his placement on a training and patrol team soothed his clan head's ambitions, offered a Village prodigy valuable instruction under the Copy Ninja's care, and calmed the Fire Shadow's guilt over having a twelve year old in his Black Ops. Mouse's Wood Release was rumored to be even better than the Sharingan at controlling Tailed Beasts, and he could gain some valuable social and communication skills in a team with my Taicho and I; I assume the decision was made before I 'randomly' transformed into kind of an asshole 'overnight.'

So I saw no reason why a fifth piece had been added to an already solved puzzle, unless the Fire Shadow just liked to fuck with us. Which was possible. I held fond memories of him, but looking back with a far more advanced mind I found much to be suspicious of. I held no personal relation to such a busy man, only military resource. And yet, he found time to play at Dumbledore's "kindly grandfather" persona and endear himself to me. I don't blame him though. Back during the Blood War, if some random kid showed up with a demon as powerful as the Nine-Tails in his gut, I'd endear myself to him too. Hell, I'd probably adopt him and feed him ice cream every night, so he never turned on me and mine, and seven years down the line I can point him at my enemies and shout 'kill!'

I could understand the move. I hated him for it, because it _was_ blatant manipulation, but I could understand it.

"Taicho," I hummed non-commitedly, rounding the bend in the glade in that half-sprint all ANBU who can't pull of a Body Flicker are supposed to manage when a superior officer calls their tag name. I was just turning to my new partner when my Sensory caught up with my dash and caught the taste of cold snake venom, the coppery tang of blood, and pure sugar. "Oh, fuck."

"Nice to meet you too, Foxy," came the heavily amused response.

I double-checked: violet hair, teasing attire, sadistic and slightly demented grin that can be sensed through the mask; yes, this is the crazy snake lady who tortured me, and the Kami seemed to think I'd trust her to watch my back.

She makes me think of a pre-Azkaban Bellatrix Black. Which is not a compliment. Not at all.

"No offense, Crow-sama, I'm sure you have a great personality," I began, pausing briefly as Taicho tried and failed to muffle a snicker. "Somewhere... somewhere deep, deep down... But we didn't exactly get off to the greatest start. Can I trade her back for a new one, Taicho?"

"So you remember, huh?" Crow, who I knew as torturer extraordinaire Mitarashi Anko, said. I thought I heard a hint of something undefinable underneath, but couldn't really tell. It's not like I blamed her for interrogating me – it was her job, after all – but she made me weak, and that cannot be excused. "I'll have to tell Inoichi-san his Technique, which has a flawless success record, failed."

"I remember enough," I managed, "but it seems Yamanaka-san failed to account for my alien neurology and advanced regenerative capabilities."

Idly I wondered if Inoichi, clan head of the Yamanakas, would make the same mistake twice if word got out I just casually murdered someone who was probably his uncle something-or-other. Probably not. Then again, I wouldn't walk out of the Interrogation & Extraction chamber alive if he knew.

Good thing I plan on taking that little tidbit to the grave. I feel rather hypocritical condemning Crow for sanctioned torture when I just murdered an innocent, comatose man. Oh well. I never made a claim for sainthood.

"Maybe a spar will cheer you up?"

"You'd destroy me," I countered, voice deadpan. "I have one week of training, Crow-sama." I wonder if throttling my partner is against the ANBU rulebook – I wouldn't know, Taicho never gives me time to read it. Nevertheless I decide not to continue this utterly unproductive conversation until I have the strength to back it up, without resorting to my magic, which I'm trying to keep hidden, and am not juvenile enough to bust out over a cat fight. "Just don't touch me, and we'll get along like a house on fire."

"Oh, they grow up so fast! Already acting so mature and worldly!" Taicho exaggeratedly tackle-hugged me, but was moving slowly enough that my extremely limited knowledge of the Body Replacement Technique let me switch myself with Crow. She was less than impressed, leering down at her new Taicho, whose speed suddenly ratcheted up several notches and was just barely able to avoid her no-doubt poisoned kunai. "Why, my adorable little sister? Why would you do such things to me?"

"You can't touch me either, Taicho-niisan," I drawled. "Last time you did, you tried to cop a feel, once more forgetting I'm – as you so eloquently put it – _you're adorable little sister. _Creep."

Crow laughed, while I shot Taicho a confused look when he pretended to wail in grief. It was a little... much, even for him. Is there something going on?

"What has you so excited, Taicho?" Crow asked, sensing the same thing. Her tone was casual, as if she already knew the man rather well. She paused before the respectful address, as if wanting to say something else, lending credence to this theory.

"It's nothing, cute little kohai," he teased, and I rolled my eyes behind my fox mask. Then I remembered the idea I had not thirty minutes ago and figured there's no better time to ask than now.

"Taicho," I began slowly. "I was practicing my Sensing earlier, and I noticed that all of the Nine Tails' chakra in my Seal is physical energy. I seem to be having a problem with physical energy..."

Just like how the soul and mind generates spiritual energy, the body generates physical energy. Chakra is a mix of the two, and the more perfect the balance, the more stable the chakra. I have two souls and a collective thirty year old mind, but my body, despite seemingly being that of a young adult, only produces the physical energy of a five year old. A hyper and demonic five year old, but a five year old all the same.

In most situations, I would have to ramp up my physical exercise to correct the imbalance; which is what I've been doing. But the situation could also be solved in reverse. If I were to continuously pump pure physical energy into my body, it would grow stronger and my vitality would skyrocket at a pace that far outmatched that of exercise alone. Lucky me, I have a demon formed entirely out of demonic Yang chakra trapped in my gut.

"You didn't touch it, did you?" He asked, voice finding a thread of steel.

"Did I fuck around with the Seal holding the world's most powerful demon at bay from tearing me and my Village to shreds? No, I did not, Taicho," I deadpanned, and the childish assassin before me had the grace to act sheepish and scratch the back of his ridiculous hair. I refrained from mentioning that if this Village had more Seal Masters, specifically one I could Legilimize on the sly, I probably would have fucked around with it. No one needs to know _that._ "From what little I know, the Seal is supposed to leak more and more Nine Tails chakra into my system over the years as my body matures enough to handle it. But I jumped from five to seventeen, and the Seal didn't get the memo. I was wondering if there would be a way to cook two Rock shinobi with one Grand Fireball, so to speak, and fix my little muscle problem while updating the Seal."

Crow shrugged in that universal way all non-academic shinobi have whenever Fuuinjutsu is mentioned, and wondered off to go do whatever it is torturers do when they're not torturing people. Mouse, who was eavesdropping not at all subtly from a tree that I swear hadn't been there twenty minutes ago, slipped away while Taicho had his back turned. Weasel didn't bother trying to hide his spying, matching Crow's clueless shrug, and went back to his Interceptor Taijutsu katas.

Taicho seemed to get an eager glint to the sole eye not covered by his modified ANBU half-mask. He tried to pass it off as nothing, but wasn't putting much effort into the charade.

"Jiraiya-sama of the Sannin should be arriving at the Village in a few days. Hokage-sama recalled him a week after you vanished when it became clear we might need all the resources we can get in order to find you. He was on the opposite side of the Elemental Nations, which is why it has been taking so long, but when he gets here he likely plans on taking a look at your Seal _anyways._ We can mention your idea then."

"Ah, I see," I nodded, very carefully not leaking any of my own excitement at the thought of Jiraiya returning to the Village, even if only for a short stay. I had quickly become a fanatic of his series, even if Taicho doesn't give me much time to read. Jiraiya's a strong shinobi too, I guess, but that's not as important. "So that's what has you in such a buzz."

"I don't know what you're talking about," he lied.

I just smirked at him. He was a shinobi, he could probably smell my amusement or something, mask or no mask.

Clearly, he didn't like that. He sniffed. "Get back to training, Fox. Ten more laps."

"Yes, Taicho," I muttered, attempting a Body Flicker and narrowly avoiding a nasty face-plant into one of Mouse's seemingly random trees. Fucking artificial Senju and their spontaneous forests.

I set a heavy pace around Training Field Forty Two once more, ignoring Taicho's snickers and my almost instinctual urge to plot his gruesome murder, and focused once more on the implicit memories of Yamanaka Inoshasa.

_Knowledge cannot be directly lifted from the target's mind, only verified or annulled... Personality can be forcibly altered through continuous use of the Artificial Character Subversion Technique... The existence of foreign influence on a specified mind can be determined through use of the basic Mind-Body Switch Technique, as all external stimuli will remain behind with the target's body... There is no known way to verify mental training in a target without catching them in the act of casting a Yamanaka-esque Kinjutsu..._

* * *

**_A/N:_**_ A week early! Huzzah!_

_By the by, I've been updating the earlier chapters every couple of days. This is my first story, and I'm still getting used to this whole "writing" thing. There's not really any need to go back and reread them, it's more for my state of mind than anything else, and if I add in something really important I'll mention it up top in the latest upload._

_Anyways. Next chapter will be split in two parts - Anko being an asshole and Jiraiya being an asshole. Sounds like fun._

_Cheers._


End file.
